Our new summer love - The Mercedes estate

As with all our executive cars, we have added additional features to this new E-Class estate which are designed to enhance your journey with us. The spacious interior benefits from rear controlled air conditioning and heated rear seats (just wait until those chilly early mornings in winter!). Whilst for sunnier days there are sun-blinds and privacy glass too. We have even added a luggage partitioning system in the spacious boot designed to prevent items moving around when in transit. 

This is the first estate car for our ever expanding fleet, which got us thinking about the history of estate cars and their rise in popularity from functional station wagons to stylish executive cars. The very first ‘station wagons’ were created in America from a truck chassis with a railway carriage welded on top used to transport people to and from the station – hence the name! 

From this functional start, in 1922 an American company in Detroit called Essex, developed a more passenger friendly version adding covered seats rather than wooden benches plus a window in place of curtains. It was largely American manufacturers who continued to evolve the design of the station wagon during the 1930’s, with the greatest developments occurring post World War II when wood body construction was replaced by steel bodies. During the late 1950’s through to mid-1960’s the market in America continued to expand as more manufactures including Oldsmobile, American Motors, GM and Chrysler continued to bring new models onto the market.

It was not until 1977 at the Frankfurt Auto Show when Mercedes-Benz introduced their bespoke estate version of their popular W123 model as they entered the touring and transport market. Today the C-Class and E-Class estate models have become a staple of modern family life to transport kids, dogs, luggage and sports equipment! Our E-Class can comfortably transport three passengers plus luggage – which is perfect if you have a plane to catch to go on your summer holiday.